Prepare for Change

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/12/archeologists-find-more-evidence-that-drought-brought-down-the-mayan-empire/ "During the era when the Mayan empire declined, Droxler said, the region underwent significantly fewer major tropical typhoons — only one or two every 20 years instead of the usual five or six. While typhoons can bring devastating winds and flooding, they also bring much-needed water inland in the form of heavy rains. These heavy rains were an integral part of growing enough food to sustain the sprawling empire. The first great blow to the civilization came in the form of a 100-year drought between 800 A.D. and 900. When the rains stopped, food because scarce and a period of violent unrest ensued." Climate change can bring an end to civilizations.  If it's changing, for whatever reason, we need to know how so we can plan ahead.

http://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/injustice-intersection-suburbs-traffic-engineering-poverty "The pretext Darren Wilson used to stop Michael Brown was jaywalking, the same offense for which Raquel Nelson nearly went to jail. Jaywalking, as Peter Norton shows in his landmark history  Fighting Traffic , is an invented crime. It was the product of a massive publicity campaign orchestrated by automobile companies and allied motoring interests in the 1920s. Ostensibly aimed to promote safety, the real purpose of this effort was to push pedestrians off the street so that cars would move faster and be easier to sell. Along with their invention of jaywalking, the automakers exerted a controlling influence over the nascent discipline of traffic engineering. Industry-funded experts denied that speed was to blame for an epidemic of pedestrian crashes. They designed new roadways with the overriding objective of moving cars faster. As the years went by, engineerin...

http://www.newsweek.com/how-fix-poverty-write-every-family-basic-income-check-291583 "In switching over to a universal basic income, the books will not only stay balanced—they might even move into the black. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are 115,227,000 households in the U.S. Split $1.88 trillion among all these households and each one gets $16,315.62. In other words, if you turned the welfare system into a $15,000 basic income payment, you’d end up saving over $150 billion (or $1,315.62 per American household). The basic proposal can be tweaked, of course, so that the system makes a bit more sense. Households making over $100,000 per year probably get by just fine on their own. Cut them out of the equation, and you would end up with a $20,000 basic income check for the remaining households, while still netting the government some nice savings. Despite the pleasingly round back-of-the-napkin math, replacing food stamps and other artifacts of America...

http://www.engadget.com/2014/11/28/topaz-solar-power-plant/ "Solar power just hit one of its biggest milestones, in more ways than one. First Solar recently finished building Topaz , a 550-megawatt plant that represents the largest active solar farm on the planet. And we do mean large -- the installation's nine million solar panels cover 9.5 square miles of California's Carrizo Plain. It's an impressive feat that should power 160,000 homes on Pacific Gas and Electric's grid, although it won't be alone at the top for very long. First Solar's Desert Sunlight farm will match that capacity once its last solar cells go online, and SunPower's 579MW Solar Star is due to go live in 2015." Looking good.  Little maintenance.  No pollution. https://www.google.com/maps/@35.3824165,-120.0600113,5525m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/money/business/blogs/innovation/2014/11/19/disruptive-innovation/19287059/ " Disrupt is perhaps the most misused term in entrepreneurship. Successful new companies can indeed disrupt an industry. Amazon disrupted book retailing. Its ascent caused the failure of the incumbent Borders. Two conditions are required for disruption. First, a substantial fraction of the market must prefer the product or service of the new company. Second, the incumbents must be unable to respond and replicate. When those conditions are met, a new entrant can gain sufficient market share that existing firms fade into irrelevance. But disruption is rare, and it’s not required for entrepreneurial success." On the other hand... http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/uber-taxi-app-fuels-montreal-toronto-fare-wars-1.2648878 "Cabbies in Montreal and Toronto want their cities to put the brakes on Uber, the popular car service app that taxi firms s...

http://www.treehugger.com/tiny-houses/modern-prefab-gets-closer-right-mix-quality-and-price-solo-40.html "Really, when you get right down to it, the Solo 40 is pretty much a 'Park Model' design, a legal definition of a house that is 15' wide and less than 540 square feet in Canada, 400 in the USA. This is a smart move; Altius has learned to max out the size, (it keeps getting cheaper per square foot) lose the high tech stuff like solar and keep it simple (parks have sewer, water and electric hookup) get rid of lofts and things that complicate construction and try and find the right balance between quality and price, which is really, really hard to do. (People are still going to complain IT'S $195 PER SQUARE FOOT!!! )" You still need storage space, though.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/17/hong-kong-protests-2014_n_6175464.html " HONG KONG (AP) — Workers in Hong Kong on Tuesday started clearing away barricades at one site of the student protest that has rocked the city for the last two months. The removal comes after a Hong Kong court granted a restraining order against the protesters last week requiring them to clear the area in front of a tower in the central part of Hong Kong as well a separate order against a second protest site Mong Kok brought by taxi and minibus operators. The workers could be seen cutting plastic ties holding the barricades together. Students, who have been protesting for greater democracy in the former British colony, did not resist. Some protesters had already moved their tents to other parts of the protest zone ahead of the clearance operation." Students are being peaceful. The government is being peaceful, after first attacking the protesters.  It looks like people are learni...